where do you play hu ?

hi
i am starting this thread in order we can give information to each other about the platforms where we play , about the trafic and the difficulty of the game

I am playing on ipoker mixing it up between nl100 and nl200 . I think the trafic is best from afternoon until late in the night ( est european time
) .
you can find a decent number of bad players and you can get a game running anytime . There arent too many regulars and i dont think i saw any of them who is realy good at this limits

I am looking to split my roll with another platform so i am waiting for you to share your experience here
gl

You are playing monster limits for me
I need a lot time to get to NL200 HU cash

I'm playing 6,25 SNG's on Stars. I had the bankroll for $10, but I'm playing only to learn. When I have the bankroll I will love to start playing a lot of cash HU.

Imo, for playing HU you need a lot of volume
So stars and FTP is better than others
There is more players, so there is more fish. I know that the grinders there are nearly immortal, but this is the reason for table selection

Tell me how you start playing HU and are this the only thing you are playing ATM

hi kukkiwonBG
you are definetly right . the higher the volume the better. you have a lot of space to table select and you will find more fish (witch is the key in being succesfull at hu at any stakes).
its funny how i started playing mainly hu . i was playing nl100 6max and the games were nity and i was 4 bins down . the games were bad all day so i decided to try some hu to get more action . i had a nice upswing and i noticed that is realy profitable and fun having the fish just for your own so i went on from there
having a much better winrate then in 6 max . this sums it up
gl

This post has been edited 2 time(s), it was last edited by Michailewic: 06.11.2008 12:14.

Hi,

I sometimes play HU on Fulltilt - NL50. And as it was said, it is fun. During the first 20 hands, you will find out, how agressive the opponent is. If he is 3-betting much, you can easy change the table since you can make less mistakes if your opponents fold to your 3-bets

Once I sat to a NL 50 HU table and started to play with an opponent having $290. So I tought he must be pretty good.

He was quite agressive (his final stats: VPIP:53, PFR:46, AF: 3,1 hands:175; at the beggining and middle of the game, his agression and PFR was higher) but I manged to exploit it.

At the beginning (after 4 hands I think), I lost $25. I made rebuy to full $50 and then few hands later I doubled up (Nl 50 Hu: 33): I raised with 33 as SB and hit four of kind on the flop (on the river, he hit a straight with 22).

Later on, I caught his bluf on the river (Nl 50 Hu: Qq). If he had a kind on the turn or better, he would have raised me; with a flush draw on the flop, he would have raised me. So with blank river, I put him on a trash or on something week so I checked for bluff induce.

In the end, we were both deep (me: $208, villain: $138). In one hour, I won approx. $133. I.e. 152 BB/100 profit.

But what I wanted to say is you do not have to be affraid of agressiver players. You just need to adapt to them. I think that the villain managed to gather $290 because of his agressive play against players who did not adapt. Maybe, it was because I managed to double up to $93 and it was not easy to play against me since we were both very deep (especially in the end). But it was not easy for me, either.

I noticed that there are many fish after midnight CET.

And so far I have managed to be sucessfull at HU tables. But I really do not look forward to my first downswing on HU

hi Michailewic
very nice you had some good experiences with hu and you noticed it is profitable . Considering his stats the player you played wasnt a bad one and i think he is a winner in that games but you adapted to his play and had a good win . altough this is a good thing i dont usualy sugest to play this kind of players who put preasure on you because there are a lot of weaker ones who just donate money . So try to table select more when playing . I sugest you to open your own tables and wait for players to sit down . in 20 hands you usualy know if you have a good or bad opponents . usualy people who sit and wait are better because fish want action and they cant wait for someone to join .... they go and join a game theirselfs
unfortunately downswings are inevitable in poker but when having one is very important to keep your focus and dont tilt money away
whenever you play and have some interesting hands you can post them from now on here and we will discuss them
gl

This post has been edited 1 time(s), it was last edited by Michailewic: 05.11.2008 15:18.

I think you was quite good but it must have been pretty hard to play so deep.

Usually, I try to avoid players who 3-bets very often. But as regards this player, I realized that I adapted to his game therefore I kept playing with him. And he was not maniac. As you mentioned, he put a presure on me but so did I.

When playing with him, I realized more than ever how important is the position (he also did not 3-bet me often when he was OOP and he did not continue with many hands OOP after my bet - neither did I to his bets when I was OOP). Further, after appox. 30 hands we were both deep (and it continued to be deeper and deeper), I also realized more than ever how important pot control is (especially in heads-up when you have to play also marginal hands). It was a very good experience playing with him.

And when I play heads up, I do not play any other table. I noticed that a man picks up many reads on his opponent in such a case when he can fully concentrate to a game. In HU you must use any (real) sign of weakness (after a read). I think that playing heads-up may improve you game since you need more skills to master it and you should play more heads-up simultaneously only if you can fully concentrate on all tables.

When playing SH or FR, it is not important to be the best at the table but to be better than players with which you are mainly in spots and if you are in spots with better players, you must be very carefull. But when playing heads-up, you must be better than your opponent and therefore table selection is more important.

And I agree that it is advisable to play with more passive players since you can steal their blinds (3-bet them when you are IP with more hands) and move out of the pot when they start to be active. But I noticed that as soon as they lose a pot with a pretty good hand, many of them start to be more active and it seems that they play reasonable for HU (such as they do defend blinds - many times with a trash, but if you do not have a hand you have to fold and then they notice that you folded four times a row to their bet if you are OOP). And when they are tilting, you do not want to put your whole stack to the pot with some marginal hand. But still it is profitable to wait for a solid hand.

And thanx for advice as regards how to wait for a fish at the table.

I have one question. What is a solid winrate at HU? Because I am definitelly sure that 152 BB/100 is some kind of upswing.

you are definetly right . when playing hu you have to be focused on your opponent and pick as many tells as you can ( this is one of the most important things hu) : beting paterns , timing tells , lines that he takes with different hands on different boards ... etc . so definetly is good to play just on table and focus on it until you get better .
i usualy play 2 tables but when i have a hard game going on i either quit him or i play just on table in order i can play my best .

hmmm ... you can get a preaty good winrate hu if you table select well .
i think something like 16 ptb/100 is achieveble and not unrealistic , even more then this is possible